Still losing by 37 points, Durant spread his hands and lectured! The Rockets should recognize 4 facts after suffering 2 consecutive losses at the beginning of the season

After scoring 37 points and still losing, Durant had no choice but to spread his hands and lecture! Aiming to compete for the championship in the new season, the Rockets suffered two consecutive losses at the beginning of the season. The Rockets should recognize four facts.

The Rockets started the season with a 2-game losing streak.

The competition for the NBA regular season continues. After losing to the defending champion Thunder in double overtime in the opening game, the Rockets' first home game of the season ushered in a contest with the dark horse Pistons in the Eastern Conference. In the end, after four quarters of fierce battle, the Rockets unfortunately lost to the Pistons 111-115 and suffered a 2-game losing streak to start the season.

For this Rockets team, this kind of opening performance is unacceptable. As the big winner of the offseason, the Rockets not only acquired Durant at a low price of 8 for 1, but also successively introduced strong players such as Finney Smith, Capela and Okogie.

As a result, the fully reinforced Rockets not only failed to show their strength to compete for the championship, but suffered two consecutive losses at the beginning of the season and fell behind in the fierce competition in the Western Conference. This performance also made the Rockets recognize four facts.

Fact 1: It is difficult for Sheppard to become a talent.

With Van Jordan seriously injured, last year's No. 3 pick Shepard had high hopes. The Rockets coaching staff hopes that this young man can seize the opportunity to fill the vacancy in the point guard rotation.

As a result, Sheppard's performance was disappointing. After only scoring 9 points, 2 rebounds and 4 assists with a 27.3% shooting rate in his first game, he made 3 of 11 shots in the game and missed all 7 two-pointers. He once again had a poor performance of 9 points, 2 rebounds, 1 assist and 3 steals.

What is even worse than the inefficient shooting rate and dismal basic data is that in these two games, Sheppard showed no improvement compared to last season, and his shortcomings were extremely obvious.

As a high draft pick, Sheppard's basic physical talent is too mediocre, and he lacks impact and explosiveness on the offensive end. As a result, he is unable to form any effective offensive threat while holding the ball. Naturally, he can only do unnecessary dribbling on the outside, unable to create opportunities for himself and his teammates.

What's even worse is that Sheppard's physical confrontation and height and wingspan are also absolute disadvantages in today's NBA. Not only is he frequently called one-on-one on the defensive end, but he also has to stop the ball frequently on the offensive end to avoid being stolen. This makes it often take him 8-10 seconds to actually launch an offense when he is the ball carrier, making the Rockets' already sluggish position offense even worse.

Perhaps Shepard will realize his talent one day in the future, but there is a high probability that this will not happen with the Rockets this season. He still needs a lot of time to polish himself.

Fact 2: Van Jordan is too important

Sheppard's poor performance made people miss the seriously injured Van Jordan even more. His absence completely disrupted the Rockets' offensive and defensive system.

On the offensive end, Amen and Shen Jing had to play completely different roles from last season. The two were obviously very uncomfortable. Amen only made 2 of 8 shots in this game, and he quickly fell from the efficient 4th position in the past to the inefficient 1st position.

Shen Jing, who switched to the 4th position, also wasted too much energy on gorgeous but useless details such as dribbling behind the back, causing him to lose his original solid inside offense. He played 5 of 18 in the game and did not look like an inside player at all. The two of them obviously need some time to adapt to their new roles.

Fact 3: The shooting space is too bad

Three-point shooting has always been one of the Rockets' vital points. After Dillon and Jaylen Green left the team during the offseason, the Rockets introduced Durant and Finney Smith. Unfortunately, Van Jordan was seriously injured again, and Finney Smith also did not return due to injury.

On the offensive end, Durant is almost the only reliable three-point shooting point. Durant still maintained a 50% shooting rate in the entire game despite the extremely poor offensive space.

In addition to him, Shen Jing made 5 of 18, Amen made 2 of 8, Sheppard made 3 of 11, and Xiao Jia made 3 of 14. The four of them combined to make 13 of 51, with a shooting rate as low as 25%.

Such a poor shooting performance is partly because the Rockets lack reliable shooting points, and more importantly, there are problems with ball conduction.

As coach Uduka said after the game, the Rockets were all open, and as a result, everyone was choosing to force some difficult shots.

Fact 4: Durant is 37 years old.

The bigger challenge for the Rockets is that Durant is 37 years old. He still scored 37 points in this game and scored 60 points in the first two games. He is still trustworthy at critical moments, but in the absence of an organizer, Durant played very tired.

The Rockets cannot expect him to take on a larger role than when he was young. The other young players must step up to solve the problem and share the pressure on Durant to prevent him from being consumed prematurely.

It can also be seen from some of Durant's actions at the decisive moment that the veteran was not satisfied with the performance of the young players around him. In the last 5.5 seconds of the game, Durant, who was sitting alone at the other end of the bench, looked helpless and said something to Ethan, Xiaojia, Amen and Shen Jing sitting at the other end. It was obvious that the 37-year-old Durant was very anxious, after all, he did not have much time left in his career.